The schadenfreude stems from a tweet from Wes Miller, Research VP at Directions on Microsoft, which points out that Microsoft's boilerplate from its last two annual SEC filings has some interesting revisions, as seen here.

To be fair, Rosoff did a little digging in the same SEC filings and discovered that Linux was still present in the documents, most notably as competition in the server and embedded spaces.

First off, let's be clear: in the passage Miller and Rosoff gleefully cite, Google is still mentioned as competition on the desktop. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Google's desktop offering ChromeOS actually Linux?

Why yes, yes it is.

So, while Microsoft seems to be sweeping the Linux problem under the rug, anyone with half a brain can see that Linux is still a threat here, if not in actual name.

I would be dishonest if I were to suggest that at this time ChromeOS has significant market share against Windows. Frankly, no operating system does. But Linux is still in Microsoft's radar, never fear.

Let me see if I have got this straight: Linux, according to Microsoft, has lost on the desktop, even though one of its cited competitors uses Linux. Meanwhile, a lot of smart people (besides just Dean) are pointing at mobile (tablets and smartphones) as the Next Platform, and right now Windows' mobile offering can't get mobile traction to save its life, while a Linux-based OS is kicking butt and taking names on smartphones and isn't doing too bad on tablets.

Boy, I'm so glad Rosoff is here to point such things out to me. Otherwise I might actually be worried.